Can Second Life become a touristic spot?
“Abbots Aerodrome is the place to go if you have a head for heights and a taste for adventure. If you’re visiting on a budget, arrive only to beat the crowds and then head to the top of the skydiving tower.”
You probably think that it is an excerpt from a Lonely Planet or another touristic guide… well you’re not wrong, except that it is a touristic guide to Second Life. Across 223 pages, Paul Carr and Graham Pond invite you to spend your holidays in Second Life in “The Unofficial Tourists’ Guide to Second Life”.
For somebody really down to earth like I am, I just don’t get it, even if I have spent some time in SL not to have a biased judgment. First, how can only 40K users at the same time (source: Forrester research) can spend so many time building touristic places in SL? And, even more worrying, how can people think that tourism in Second Life can be as great as in reality?
Anyways, I have been just amazed by the number of “places to visit” in Second Life, and I have made a quick selection of what I find the most surprising:
Svarga: it is a kind of SL paradise where there is an entire ecosystem such as in real life (clouds rain to make flowers grow, which are pollinated by bees… well you get it).
Virtual Hallucinations: it is a place aimed at raising awareness about schizophrenia, where your avatar can experiment the sound of voices, visual hallucinations, illusions of himself in a mirror… Really scary.
Hearts Enchanted: it is a place where you can simply have a really advanced experience of fishing. And you can even keep the fish at the end!
Regina Spektor Audio Kiosk: I am a personal fan of Regina Spektor’s music, and even if she is not so much known in real life, she is apparently a star in SL, as you can visit her virtual loft, listen to her music and even nip up the iron staircase and have a snooze.
Wheelies: it is a nightclub dedicated to disabled but also able-bodied clubbers (or avatars!).
Machinima: it is the burgeoning movie industry in SL, where movies are played by avatars themselves. You can even see kind of a SL teenage drama here on Youtube: definitely a new style!
Bruno Echegaray’s immersive spheres: Your avatar enters a 360° sphere where pieces of art are displayed. I kind of like those initiatives as they are a new way to show art (see my post about art in virtual worlds). I must also mention Kula, the Creative Commons Island, where you can find a lot of free art that you can even remix.
And finally, as it is common knowledge that one of the basis of SL is sex, you can go to Xcite to buy you some… genitals (and lots of other things I don’t even want to mention!).
So if you’re really interested in SL phenomenon, you should definitely buy this book, but you will have to keep in mind that with the number of users decreasing, it won’t really matter how amazing the places to visit are.
And finally, just to make this post a little bit funnier, here is a “real” video which shows all the bugs of SL which are for the moment a major problem for its expansion:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flkgNn50k14]
Fidji is a co-author on Tech IT Easy. You can find out more about him on this blog’s initial announcement or on her site. She enjoys real trips around the world, with real people, real seas and real fishes.
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Ha, nice post Fidji! You make Second Life sound like the poor man’s dream holiday-destination. Or in my case, a place to visit after I spent too much money on my last holiday.
If SL manages to appear like the poor man’s dream holiday destination, then it has a huuuge potential! And if books like that start being read by more and more people, they will definitely convince curious people to take a look…and get stuck!
excellent video ! For me SL is 90% bugged (very vere slow)
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