Web Worker Daily

Who by now has not seen at least some of the hype for Second Life, the massively multiplayer digital universe run by Linden Labs? Edging rapidly towards the six million resident mark (though some real life human beings have multiple identities “in world”) and home to corporate presences as diverse as Coca-Cola, UGS, and Reuters, it’s been the subject of much press coverage in the last few years.

Despite the rapid growth of Second Life’s user base, it’s fair to say that most people (even most web workers) have no real conception of what it’s like, or why they might want an account there. Now, it’s true that you can find virtual sex, anti-social jerks, eight-foot-tall furry animals wearing clothes, and heavily-armed mercenaries in the world of Second Life. In that, it reminds me a lot of classic usenet, or IRC when I first started using it, or any other frontier of communication. The frontiers tend to be wild and woolly places.

But they also tend to be interesting and innovative places. Information Week’s Mitch Wagner suggests (and I agree) that Second Life is “a glimpse of what the Internet will probably look like in 15 years.” Think back 15 years: did you have VOIP? Instant messaging? E-mail? All of those technologies looked equally crazy when they were first starting out. In addition to the game players and loony-tunes, Second Life is home to a growing population of early adopters, futurists, and technological visionaries.

I’ve been seriously inhabiting Second Life for a few months now, and my evaluation at this point is yes, you can use it for business as well as for play. In particular, I find it a much better environment for online meetings than old-style multi-user chat rooms. The virtual setting - which can range from conference room to beach club to rain forest to, well, anything, depending on the needs and desires of the meeting organizers - can do a lot to set the tone for the meeting and relax the participants.

Although I’ve heard this dismissively referred to as “IRC with sock puppets,” most people don’t seem to treat it that way. In fact, it seems to me that the younger you are, or the further you are from being a purely technical wonk, the more you’ll be willing (in general) to get immersed in an environment like Second Life, and to treat it as a virtual third place, with all the social benefits that brings. In addition to business contacts, I’ve made friends in world, attended parties, and just generally had a good time - none of which is necessary to doing business, but it’s a nice fringe benefit.

Is Second Life necessary to web worker success? No - but when you come right down to it, neither is Skype, videoconferencing, chat rooms, or much of the other technology that we experiment with. Is it useful in some situations to web workers? Absolutely. In a few more years, we’ll be routinely exchanging virtual reality contact info (perhaps for Second Life, perhaps for one of its descendants) as routinely as we exchange e-mail addresses now. This is your chance to get in on the ground floor. If you want to look me up in world to kick these ideas around some more, you’ll find me using the name MikeG1 Schumann there.