Get a Life, they said ...
Sunday, December 30th, 2007 12:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tamaranth... so last night I created a SecondLife account, and spent a few hours playing.
I feel kind of dirty now.
Technologically speaking, it's pretty fab, though there are still rough edges where (like early DOOM) I find myself embedded in walls; where an object doesn't behave as it claims to behave; where even my high-spec laptop struggles with rendering and resolution. (There's a reason I didn't try this before: the system requirements.)
My first impulse was to make my avatar look like me. I suspect quite a lot of the SL population go for wish-fulfilment, but for some reason that route didn't interest me. OK, my avatar's hair is somewhat redder than mine, and the eyeliner is a nicer shade of green: but people who know me in real life would probably be able to recognise me in SL (though I don't think the converse would be true.)
After that, though, I spent a lot of time wandering around. Yay flight. Yay teleport. Yay pretty backdrops and clever effects. I noted:
- I am even shyer in SL than in RL. Every time anyone else got close, I fled.
- When I first ventured online, back in the early 1990s (email) practically the first thing that happened was that I got propositioned. Same here.
- I am, as yet, not interested in doing anything. I just want to sit somewhere quietly, and watch.
- I am not inclined to spend RL money on SL acquisitions: nor am I prepared to do anything in SL (such as getting money by clicking surveys) that will affect anything outside the game.
- Notwithstanding that, there is a certain desire to acquire, a desire to 'build' a house (or, better, a ship) and make my own space and so on. But I think that's probably more to do with the sense of aimlessness, the lack of a game plan.
- It really did feel like being in Gibson's or Stephenson's cyberspace (though some of the avatars reminded me more of Tanith Lee's Don't Bite the Sun)
- I can imagine using it the way I use IM / Jabber: a virtual meeting-place for people I already know, either from RL or from online communities.
- I can imagine using it to explore some of my psychological boundaries, like the shyness.
So, do any of you have SL accounts that you use? What do you do with them? Why? Where?
I feel kind of dirty now.
Technologically speaking, it's pretty fab, though there are still rough edges where (like early DOOM) I find myself embedded in walls; where an object doesn't behave as it claims to behave; where even my high-spec laptop struggles with rendering and resolution. (There's a reason I didn't try this before: the system requirements.)
My first impulse was to make my avatar look like me. I suspect quite a lot of the SL population go for wish-fulfilment, but for some reason that route didn't interest me. OK, my avatar's hair is somewhat redder than mine, and the eyeliner is a nicer shade of green: but people who know me in real life would probably be able to recognise me in SL (though I don't think the converse would be true.)
After that, though, I spent a lot of time wandering around. Yay flight. Yay teleport. Yay pretty backdrops and clever effects. I noted:
- I am even shyer in SL than in RL. Every time anyone else got close, I fled.
- When I first ventured online, back in the early 1990s (email) practically the first thing that happened was that I got propositioned. Same here.
- I am, as yet, not interested in doing anything. I just want to sit somewhere quietly, and watch.
- I am not inclined to spend RL money on SL acquisitions: nor am I prepared to do anything in SL (such as getting money by clicking surveys) that will affect anything outside the game.
- Notwithstanding that, there is a certain desire to acquire, a desire to 'build' a house (or, better, a ship) and make my own space and so on. But I think that's probably more to do with the sense of aimlessness, the lack of a game plan.
- It really did feel like being in Gibson's or Stephenson's cyberspace (though some of the avatars reminded me more of Tanith Lee's Don't Bite the Sun)
- I can imagine using it the way I use IM / Jabber: a virtual meeting-place for people I already know, either from RL or from online communities.
- I can imagine using it to explore some of my psychological boundaries, like the shyness.
So, do any of you have SL accounts that you use? What do you do with them? Why? Where?
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: Sunday, December 30th, 2007 01:22 pm (UTC)I also tried to create an avatar that looks something like me, although I'm not sure how accurately - in particular, the SL avatar-tweaker doesn't seem to cope with thinning hair very well. Mind you, it probably was pretty realistic, as I didn't suffer from the second issue you mentioned ;-) Joking aside, I've also wondered about using it as a way of practising meeting people, but the social context is so different from real life that I'm not convinced how well the experience would read across.
SL does remind me a bit of the joke about how the first fax machine was sold in 1861, and remained unused until the second one was sold in 1933. Whenever I've logged in I've been in splendid isolation, which is fine for admiring the pretty bits but not so good for actual socialising. Perhaps we need a virtual pub? Actually,
no subject
Date: Sunday, December 30th, 2007 08:21 pm (UTC)There are some cool things there. Steam train! Virtual planetarium! But, As We Have Seen, one can socialise, and drink virtual beer, and admire virtual sunrise from the deck of a virtual ship. As long as said ship doesn't suddenly disintegrate ...
Also, see icon.
no subject
Date: Sunday, December 30th, 2007 02:15 pm (UTC)The nearest I got was I tried World of Warcraft for a while. Looks very nice, but I mostly played it as if it was single player. Mostly as I couldn't be bothered joining a group to go off on a mission that might take hours when I just wanted a quick go in the evening.
In the end I got bored of the times when you spend half an hour getting from point A to point B, click various things to kill some monster, then spend half an hour getting back to point A to get the reward. It was quite tedious!
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Date: Sunday, December 30th, 2007 08:23 pm (UTC)It is just like being in an early 90s SF novel. And not necessarily in a good way.
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Date: Sunday, December 30th, 2007 10:04 pm (UTC)That's what I've always found too.
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Date: Sunday, December 30th, 2007 04:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Sunday, December 30th, 2007 08:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Sunday, December 30th, 2007 05:28 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Sunday, December 30th, 2007 08:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Sunday, December 30th, 2007 07:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Sunday, December 30th, 2007 08:18 pm (UTC)I like it for the reason I used to like wandering around DOOM with the monsters turned off. But that novelty will wear off very soon: it's the interactivity that'll make it interesting in the long run.
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Date: Sunday, December 30th, 2007 08:31 pm (UTC)Interaction *might* work, but I'd rather go to the pub. God, I've turned into my father.
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Date: Sunday, December 30th, 2007 08:55 pm (UTC)As for the rest, if you seriously think I am advocating them instead of the real stuff then I may have found a use for the exploding head icon!
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Date: Sunday, December 30th, 2007 11:21 pm (UTC)When I can _actually_ turn into a wolf and fight giant abstract/fractal insect demons _then_ you can take my copy of Zelda away.
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Date: Sunday, December 30th, 2007 08:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Sunday, December 30th, 2007 08:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Friday, January 4th, 2008 11:18 pm (UTC)