Second Life is an online multimedia platform that allows people to create an avatar for themselves and have a second life in an online virtual world. Developed and owned by the San Francisco-based firm Linden Lab and launched on June 23, 2003, it saw rapid growth for some years and in 2013 it had approximately one million regular users. Growth eventually stabilized, and by the end of 2017 the active user count had declined to "between 800,000 and 900,000". In many ways, Second Life is similar to massively multiplayer online role-playing games; nevertheless, Linden Lab is emphatic that their creation is not a game: "There is no manufactured conflict, no set objective". -Wikipedia
Your Imagination
When you go to the movies, you suspend your disbelief, accept the premise, and immerse yourself in a world where Superman has superpowers, Ethan Hunt (Mission Impossible) can break into any security system, and Captain Jean Luc Picard can fly to the stars at warp nine. When you open a book, you are transported to different places, different times, and different situations involving a cast of characters with a myriad of fascinating personalities and ambitions both evil and noble. You have left behind, temporarily, at least your own life in favor of something novel and new. Movies rake in billions of dollars each year in ticket sales. The 50 Shades of Gray trilogy has sold over 150 million copies worldwide.
With movies as with books, you are an observer. You do not have an active role in the fantasy; you are merely watching what happens. But what if you could participate? Instead of sitting there watching or reading, you could play a part in the story so that you yourself become the story!
A massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) is a video game that combines aspects of a role-playing video game and a massively multiplayer online game.
As in role-playing games (RPGs), the player assumes the role of a character (often in a fantasy world or science-fiction world) and takes control over many of that character's actions. MMORPGs are distinguished from single-player or small multi-player online RPGs by the number of players able to interact together, and by the game's persistent world (usually hosted by the game's publisher), which continues to exist and evolve while the player is offline and away from the game.
MMORPGs are played throughout the world. Worldwide revenues for MMORPGs exceeded half a billion dollars in 2005, and Western revenues exceeded a billion dollars in 2006. In 2008, the spending on subscription MMORPGs by consumers in North America and Europe grew to $1.4 billion. World of Warcraft, a popular MMORPG, had over 10 million subscribers as of November 2014. World of Warcraft's total revenue was $1.04 billion US dollars in 2014. Star Wars: The Old Republic, released in 2011, became the world's 'Fastest-Growing MMO Ever' after gaining more than 1 million subscribers within the first three days of its launch. -Wikipedia
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| Hugh Toussaint (my avatar) at The Looking Glass |
So, what is Second Life?
I repeat from Wikipedia: Linden Lab is emphatic that their creation is not a game: "There is no manufactured conflict, no set objective". World of Warcraft lays out a predefined fantasy world in which you play your character. In Second Life, nothing is predefined; you can do whatever you want.
First and foremost, SL (Second Life) is a 3D modeling environment. Not only can you build an avatar, a representation of a human being, you can build buildings, landscapes, vegetation, etc. You can construct entire cities. You can create cars, trains, airplanes, even rockets. If you can do it in RL (Real Life), you can do it in SL (Second Life). The only limitation is SL is your imagination. People recreate RL cities: London, England, Paris, France, etc. Some recreate fantasy areas based on novels. In the picture above, I visited with my avatar The Looking Glass based on Alice in Wonderland. (Below in references, I included a brief YouTube video about The Looking Glass.) Some artists create 3D art installations. Bryn Oh is a 3D artist whose work has been displayed in Real Life. In the video I linked below, there's an interview where she explains her fascination with 3D art.
But secondly, and maybe more importantly, SL is an escape. Like a movie or a book, you leave your own life behind to immerse yourself in a different world but once again, unlike a movie or a book where you are a passive observer, in SL, you are an active participant. You are part of the make believe.
People sometimes take on different roles. Vampires can be popular, or Nekos (Japanese anime cats), or "furries" (anthropomorphic animal characters). But for the most part, people play themselves, that is, a version of themselves in a virtual world, and it is here that I think the most fascinating part of Second Life comes, so to speak, to life.
Second Life gives you an avatar, a new identity, and anonymity. You are disconnected from your real world. You have the freedom to do or say anything you want without fear of criticism or condemnation. What do you do with such freedom?
I've jokingly said that for the most part, avatars seem to have a common look of a twentysomething or thirtysomething, good-looking, and physically fit. Now, some people make variations of this. Just like in RL, there are people (avatars) which are short or tall, skinny or fat, young or old. Although, old per se isn't that easy as most look at least around thirty years old, but grey hair or balding can give a more aged appearance.
You can visit places, such a London or Paris, or fictional places such as those of Allice in Wonderland. You can attend music concerts, poetry or book readings, discussions about a variety of topics from politics to science to entertainment. You can dance at various clubs from ballroom to rock n' roll.
You can meet people and interact with them. For the most part, those interactions take place in IM chat (IM = Instant Messaging), that is, text messaging. However, voice is built into the system, and you can easily talk with other people. Some people only talk (less typing), and some areas (or SIMs, SIM = Simulation or Simula tor) are dedicated to voice.
The Psychology of Second Life
Here, we get into what happens when people are granted total freedom. I'm sure psychiatrists everywhere would have a field day in SL sorting out why people do what they do. This is my personal observation after being around Second Life off and on for the past twelve years: People are far more sexual in SL than in RL. If anybody ever wondered about how repressed our society is, SL shows that removing the shackles of our Puritan culture leads to a marked increase in the interest in all things sexual. Even I am sometimes amazed at how sexual people can be despite sex being so commonplace.
Both men and women may have a string of lovers, sometimes at the same time. Men may visit sex clubs, seeking all sorts of scandalous activities. Women may take on sex work, a pole dancer slash stripper or a prostitute. Now, don't get me wrong, some people in SL never have sex, using Second Life as a means to socialize. Nevertheless, there is a significant portion of the population engaged in some sexual activity. It's difficult to escape it; it's in our nature.
Imagine going to Starbucks in real life and striking up a conversation with a stranger. You'd cover the weather, maybe the latest news, and talk about common interests such as the last movie you saw. In Second Life, you can also go to an area and meet a stranger. That SL resident has a profile they themselves have put together which may detail who they are and what they're looking for in SL. Before you even start talking, you may find out about they sexual preferences with intimate details about their kinks. The other week, I visited an area with a sex theme, saw an interesting profile, and started a chat with a woman I had never met before. We chatted about her stated interest in MMF (Male, Male, Female), emphasizing Stag/Hotwife scenarios. Now, that's not a topic of conversation that crops up at Starbucks! Ha, ha!
One could argue that all social media has a degree of anonymity. Even though your full real name is displayed in Facebook, when you interact, when you post, you are doing so a step back from other people. There is a sense of not being directly involved with other people and consequently, you may say or do things you might not carefully consider. The headlines are full of stories of people getting into trouble for not thinking through the implications of their statements.
Sex in Second Life
This is really why you're reading this article, isn't it? Ha, ha! As Guns N'Roses sang, Welcome to the Jungle! I've jokingly said that SL may really stand for Sex Life. If you can think of it, it's here.
Most sexual interactions involve IM chat. That is the main way of communicating. Avatars have sex by enabling animations which direct the avatars to recreate sexual positions. This is usually tied to sex furniture, like a sex bed. I'm sure at face value, what I'm describing seems absurd. However, it's interesting how the human mind manages to fill in the blanks. Back at the beginning of the Internet era when there may have only been text messaging, people managed to have sex. It may have been primitive, but it did manage to spark the imagination. SL goes one step further and offers a visualization. But there's more!
You have the option of voicing. Some people do nothing with their avatars, just talking (and moaning) back and forth. Some voice and use their avatars to supplement their scene. I've noted that the remote sex toy Lovense has made in-roads in Second Life. There are groups dedicated to swapping remote access so two people can have sex while controlling each other's toy.
Sex covers every kink imaginable: Vanilla (natch), BDSM, cuckold, Stag/Hotwife, MMF, MFF, orgies, the list goes on forever. Note that anything related to children goes against the Terms of Service of Linden Labs, the operators of Second Life.
Is the sex real? Why would somebody only role play sex?
In any of the first-person shooter games, Call of Duty, Bioshock, etc., people run around killing the bad guys. No, they pretend to kill somebody. It's a game. It's imagined. Note that some people prefer to imagine making love to somebody rather than to imagine shooting them. However, the sex can be real. Rather than watching porn, some people prefer to get off by interacting with somebody else. Of course, some people do web cam sex, but SL offers a layer of anonymity and hence protection. Instead of you displaying your real self, you display your avatar, and it becomes your sexual proxy.
Addiction
When I first came to SL back in 2010, it was visible in RL media. I first heard about it in TIME Magazine which piqued my curiosity. A slew of articles discussed people becoming addicted to playing the game, foregoing their own real life to live in this world of fantasy. Well, some people go nuts and that's to be expected in any activity. Today, I know people who are on Second Life every single day. Some people have jobs, and some people run businesses. But is that cause for alarm? I know people who incessantly post on Facebook or Twitter. I know somebody who took up the Irish fiddle, got bitten by the bug and now practices six to ten hours a day. According to Neilson ratings, the average American watched eight hours of television per day in the 2000s as those numbers change as people migrate to streaming services on computers and phones. (source: Statistica)
Personally, my laptop has become the center of my life. I communicate with family and friends via email, text messaging, and social media. I work on my computer. I play on my computer. I learn on my computer. Some time is spent on Second Life, yes, but a great deal of time is spent about real life. I've noted that I now do all my banking remotely. The only time I need to physically visit a branch is to get coins for the laundry machine in my apartment building. Let me add a curiosity: I do not have cable TV. I have an Internet connection but no TV services. I never watch TV. I've traded my eight hours of daily TV for other, more interactive things. Good? Bad? I was amused back in 2010 when reporting talked about addiction to SL without mentioning how the average person consumed eight hours of television per day. Holy cow!
A Word of Caution: This ain't for the faint-hearted.
Second Life's popularity peaked somewhere around 2010. Today, it has supposedly stabilized around 800,000 regular monthly users. I'll be the first to admit there's a complexity to learning how to operate the game. I've jokingly said that people may come for the sex but discover you need a PhD in computing to get to the "good stuff". Okay, let's go back to xHamster and Pornhub. Ha, ha! Certainly, anybody undertaking the game needs assistance to get started. I go to SL to socialize and consequently, have spent as little time as possible learning the more technical side of the system. Everyone is different, and some people really get into it. As I said, at the base of it all, SL is a 3D modeling environment so the sky's the limit in what you can potentially do. From an interactive point of view, you can find people from all over the world, all nationalities, languages, ages, genders, classes, education with tastes for everything including all things sexual.
Final Word
Is this like trying to explain the color red to a blind person?
Unfortunately, no one can be told what The Matrix is. You have to see it for yourself.
Over the years, I've had moments of great intensity and periods of great boredom. Like any social media, there are limitations. SL is s good or as bad as the people we meet, but the same could be said about life in general. Second Life is not for everyone, but some players remain faithful. They come and go with the ebbs and flows of their lives but the idea of connecting with another human being, whether via computer or real life, never goes away. At the end of the day, whether it be Second Life, Facebook, or Twitter or one of the other platforms like Tumbl, Flickr, or DeviantART, or even sitting in a coffee shop and striking up a conversation with a total stranger, it's all about people and the connections we experience. Add to that, whether going to the movies or picking up a good book, the desire to step out of one's life and see and do something completely different.
May all your dreams come true and may all your fantasies be realized.
References
I've written a number of articles about Second Life. I make no claims about being definitive on the subject; this is merely my opinion but I do like to think I bring a mature perspective on life, love, and the pursuit of happiness.
my blog: Anonymity and Total Freedom - Oct 4/2019
Imagine having total freedom. You can say or do anything you want with no consequences. No criticism. No condemnation. Heck, no jail time.
my blog: Ballroom Dancing and Relationships: D/s, BDMS, even Marriage - Oct 7/2019
Life is a dance.
my blog: Self-Confidence: I Know I’m Good - Oct 28/2021
I have nothing to prove.
my blog: Aggressive Males and the Stupidity of Inexperience - Sep 11/2021
I have run across numerous stories, either in profiles or in conversations, of aggressive males demanding sex. No seduction, no chat, let’s just get right to it.
Published on Sep 21/2021 by Second Life
YouTube: Second Life Destinations - The Looking Glass (1:19)
The Looking Glass is the joint creation of Marcus Inkpen and Sharni Azalee. Beautiful art and designs populate this photogenic island, which aims to host and support the arts in Second Life through live music, particle shows, and poetry readings.
Published on Nov 2/2021 by Second Life
YouTube: Second Life Spotlight - Bryn Oh (1:43)
Today we are shining a spotlight on Bryn Oh. Many Residents are familiar with her work, as she is one of the most talented virtual artists of our time and has spent more than a decade creating art in the virtual world of Second Life. Read her interview
2022-06-23
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