It’s The Sims wrapped in the World Wide Web wrapped in an enigma.
It’s called Second Life, and it’s a world just like this one, except it’s computerized – and you can fly.
Second Life is an Internet-based program that allows users to create 3-D versions of themselves that walk around and interact with the 3-D versions of other real people in a digital “world” that is more than three times the geographic size of San Francisco. There are at least 7 million registered users and about 40,000 people logged in at any given moment.
In this virtual world, you can buy land, clothes and anything else your imagination can dream up for real money. More than $200,000 is exchanged daily in Second Life.
But Second Life is far more than a game. It’s a model that could potentially ensconce the Internet and revolutionize education. Instead of going to the University of Oregon’s Web site, you could venture your 3-D self to the virtual campus and get information there. Instead of reading about ancient Rome in a textbook, you could walk through its bustling ancient streets virtually.
“Second Life is literally not a game, because there’s no back story,” said Jonathon Richter, the University’s resident Second Life guru. Richter is somewhat of a forerunner among other international researchers in establishing Second Life’s educational potential. Currently he’s working on a project to catalogue all the educational resources in Second Life.
Universities are taking the lead internationally to uncover the educational applications of the game. One way they’re starting to do that is by incorporating Second Life into the classroom. This fall, University English assistant professor Michael Aronson is teaching a class about new media and digital culture that included several lectures taught “in world.”
The class focused on what it means to communicate through a virtual identity, Aronson said.
The University received a small grant to lease space on land owned by the University of Cincinnati, which is where students met up in the virtual world.
Aronson taught a course that used Second Life two years ago. “Since then,” he said, “its presence in popular culture has become more visible.”
The University’s Teaching Effectiveness Program is holding sessions for educators on how to use Second Life, and how it is being incorporated into the classroom.
Business applications
Recently, Richter attended the first 24-conference in Second Life. He transported his virtual self, called an “avatar” to a virtual conference hall. There were individual rooms for each session, where someone gave a presentation, some using a PowerPoint presentation, and projecting their actual voice via a microphone or phone line.
“It was remarkably like an actual conference,” Richter said, who gave a presentation to dozens of people about creating a database of all the learning materials on Second Life. “I met people, I got their cards, I heard some really interesting ideas. I mean, I got all the great things of going to a real conference without having to travel, without having to sleep in a hotel bed away from my family, and I met people from all over the world. All while sitting right here in this office.”
And that’s one of the potential
advantages for the business world.
Instead of having to take an airplane to another city to give a business proposal, you can give the same presentation virtually – standing up in a conference room in front of your associates the same way you would in real life – all from the comfort of your own office chair.
Businesses are also cropping up in Second Life. CNN recently opened a news bureau there. There are real estate moguls who own and sell land and make hundreds of thousands of dollars, Richter said.
Criticisms
But the program isn’t without criticism from some educators. Wandering Second Life, one can encounter islands of pornography.
“A lot of people are worried about in education, who don’t understand it, is that they’ve heard a lot about the pornography, and the things they don’t want to see when they’re attending class,” Richter said.
Others simply find the idea of creating a second, virtual self amusing. Darren Barefoot, a Canadian technology writer, created a Web site called GetAFirstLife.com, where he sells “First Life” merchandise.
Although Barefoot says he’s not a “Second Life hater,” he’s “bemused by the amount of hype” the game is receiving, he wrote on his blog.
But Richter says the wariness to Second Life will fade in the same way wariness faded when the Internet was first invented.
“There are a ton of people who are dismissive of it,” he said. “Because it creates either fear or they’re using an inappropriate metaphor to understand what it is.”
Using Second Life for educational purposes is great in the mind of Michael Stoner, a Chicago-based consultant who advises colleges as large as Princeton on Internet strategy, but he cautions many institutions against using it for business, student recruitment or alumni relations.
“It’s one thing to say we’ve got a faculty member who’s teaching this really interesting class,” he said. “But anything that takes a whole lot more effort than that, that’s time people could be spending on contacting with clients, such as prospective students or alumni.”
There’s more to come
Second Life is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to virtual worlds. There are several other up-and-coming competitors, such as Google and Sun Microsystems, that are working to create their own virtual worlds. Once there are several in place, they’ll be linked together with Second Life to create a giant Metaverse.
“There are six to 20 new virtual environments that are coming out to compete with Second Life,” Richter said. “The Metaverse is way bigger than Second Life.”
The University is bringing an open-source project called Darkstar, which is a template for a virtual world, to campus. The University could be one of the first places to test it.
“Students’ lives are immersed in technology – except at school. That’s wrong,” Richter said. “School needs to be preparing people for the future, and if the future we’re preparing them for is not actually aligned with the
future they’re going to get, then there’s a huge disservice that the school is doing.”
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