Many individuals look for alternatives to distract themselves. Some look for board games, others may seek online interaction. “Coming of Age in Second Life” is written by Tom Boellstorff. He conducted research that would not only open my mind to possibilities but also help me to understand how some can inherit traits that would correspond to one’s culture It gives a brief introduction to what he wants to accomplish in his research by establishing certain guidelines and rules that many individuals have in their own culture/environment. This brief introduction opened my mind to possibilities, and at first, it was hard to understand why he would conduct research in a way that I believe has no sense or meaning. But as I read his book I came to the conclusion that anything can be a possibility. In the first chapter, he describes his action in Second Life, by teleporting or interacting with fellow avatars in a sense that it makes the reader believe that they are in this world away from worries.
You (the reader) are in control of your own avatar just like you are in control of your life, but later on in the chapter, he describes how some avatars are hacked into and the individual that is in charge of the avatar loses control. Real life can be described the same way. For example, a hacker can be in the form of a drug. Many abuse the drug to a sense they don’t have control of their body and would do anything to get that drug in their body. This is very similar to the hackers intervening with someone’s avatar in Second Life. They abuse the avatar to their amusement and the owner of the avatar is helpless. First, we take a look at what Second Life has to offer us before some of the bad issues are presented. Second Life gives the individual certain rights, such as the right to own land, but with a price. For a small monthly fee individuals can construct a building to their liking. You could change your appearance or alter your sex.
For those in real life who pursue a certain lifestyle can show their inner self in Second Life. For example, a man wanting to be women or women wanting to be men whatever the case, Second Life lets them seek their personal pleasure and comfort to an extent. But most seek Second Life to pass time. “It describes a mere fraction of the thousands of ways people spent time in second life during the period of my fieldwork. Some were loners; others were members of groups with hundreds of members. Some had intense emotional and sexual relationship: others came to Second Life Boa to said a boat across virtual lake, dance at a club, or play a board game, without intimacy beyond the cause acquaintance”. People in real life can be lonesome individuals who seek companionship or pleasure, or maybe seclusion from their real world problems that they might have.
Second Life also allows us to “Explore the phenomenon of virtual worlds” by being perceived as male, female, or neither”. One thing is for sure, as Tom stated, “gap between virtual and actual is crucial”. As I describe how one depicts themselves in Second life as their potential opposite sex or why they seek Second Life, the history of virtual worlds describes how one came to be in Second Life. Tom describes how the rise of the video game was the initial startup. With Atari being a big influential game console to allow the imagination run wild. It gave the person a way to step out of their bubble into a world of excitement and illusions. What really started the move forward was how Duke Nukem opened a door to a virtual 3D perspective that allowed seeing things in 3D versus the 2D, like Mario Bros. With this encoding, it allowed for SIM games to thrive the world and have individuals be who they want to be.
With this innovation of Second Life, Tom was allowed to conduct his research. The way he perceived himself was as a “Virtual Anthropologist” as opposed tone dedicated to ”Virtual Ethnography”. The reason for this was his research would not be real as opposed to the research done offline. He conducted his research by observing the individuals in the Second Life environment. Tom would get consents or permission from the individuals, and would proceed to ask questions. In a way, it’s almost like conducting the same research in a real life culture. Trying to decipher who the people in Second Life are, or why the do certain things. What made matters more interesting was to see how some would get frustrated on the “Lag” issues that were present in Second Life. Lag meant that the total number of prisms exceeded the amount that allowed the server to process. If one seeks extravagant lifestyles in Second Life, they could experience “lag” issues.
This could involve Either delaying ones avatar to move around, or disabling communication with one another. This didn’t just delay one avatar, it delayed everyone equally. Making them experience slowness and sometime boredom. Having ”lag” issues started a frenzy of acronyms being introduced. The abbreviations helped shorten the conversation to simple letters that mean a phrase, like “afk” or ”brb”. These acronyms have built Second Life as a unique culture to the point where even in today’s real life people use these abbreviations. Obviously they are not said out loud in spoken words, but in forms of text message. It allows individuals to express themselves in a way they might otherwise be afraid to express like “lol” or “lmao” for laughing my ass off. One can’t really laugh their ass off, but this form of expression (LMAO) shows that they are laughing to a point where their stomach is hurting from laughing so much.
Tom’s research on Second Life has showed that even coming from virtual worlds acronyms have breached our personal life. As issues in Second Life persist, Tom talks about intimacy within Second Life. If someone was to see intimacy. one might think that one is reading on sex or personal pleasure, but it can range in a variety of ways and friendship is one of them. “Friendships are the foundation of cyber sociality”. Having multiple friends in a virtual world gives a sense of satisfaction, as if they were to have friends in real life. However, this could also mean that they might not have many friends in the real world and seek companions in Second Life. What was interesting to me is reading the actions one takes in Second Life, as written in the sexuality portion of Tom’s. People tend to act certain ways in real life, and many have their dark secrets, like dominatrices.
People who have their weird sex life is their business in the real life, which is the same in Second Life. People try to get away from others to conduct their sexual pleasures, but cant. Do to the maps that showing multiple individuals in one spot where one can teleport to their location. But what makes it personal is what they can do to get away from those around them. The skybox helps them isolate themselves from other avatars in Second Life. In a sense it is the same when one hides their whips in a locked location away from people in real life. By having sexual pleasures online, one might think that it can be an addiction. This brought fears of ”Internet Addiction Disorder”.
But to Tom’s research it didn’t have any useful psychological disorder. But it did bring an essence of “symptomatic of anxieties about selfhood, agency, and intentionality that lie at the core of discourse of the virtually human”. One can be drawn to Second Life to get away from problems, like taking drugs to get away from one’s problems. Second Life provides a rush that allows anyone to be different and unique That is why “Virtual Addiction” has effects with one’s life in real life. “any time you spend online is time not spend on other parts of your life”. Spending one minute can be hours in real life. It lets you escape reality. Just like taking a drug. It is done to pass time and to forget one’s issues. In conclusion, Tom has opened the doors and possibilities to me He has demonstrated that a virtual world can coincide with the real life.
People do many things to get away from people in real life. By doing so it allows them to be themselves. However, at the same time having interaction with others, even in different parts of the world, has allowed people to engage with societies that one wouldn’t believe they could. It has opened the doors to worldwide social media network that allows conversations that everyone can understand. By being able to write and read English, it allows people from China, Indonesia, France, Germany to interact with Americans and with one another. Of course, their English might be a little ungrammatical, but by understanding the simple sentence structure of what they are trying to say it allows everyone to be equal.
