First Impressions

Choosing an SL name and avatar took more time than I anticipated. I generally don’t put much time and thought into these things, perhaps because I don’t invest a lot in VR personas…it’s the same with video games. I never care what my avatar is called or looks like, I just want to start the game already. But I wanted to put a little thought into it this time, my particular objective being to choose a name with no RL equivalent. Why not? I found it interesting that the choice in last names is limited to the list provided…I looked for Talaj as a last name, didn’t see it, and wondered if they periodically change the choices. “Vita” was one of the choices, Latin and Italian for “life,” and thought about doing a cheesy first name/last name combo in Latin such as “Sweet Life,” “Strange Life” or even “Second Life,” but finally decided to go with an aesthetically pleasing (and less-cheesy) first/last name combo – a small RL desire that I might live out in SL – and stuck with the Latin for the first name. For my avatar, I was expecting there to be a lot of choices and was surprised to see the limited few to start with. After contemplating for a long time between the male animal character and the female girl next door, I went with the plain and simple one…thinking I’d worry more about what I looked like later…if ever. It’s a chore to worry about what one looks like in RL, for me anyhow, so it seems illogical to force that upon myself in SL. I thought being a different gender and/or species might add an interesting dimension to my experience, but ultimately decided that my first plunge into SL would be rife with enough interesting dimensions already…and I can always create another avatar later, should I want. It’s too early to tell what my relationship to my avatar will be – on the one hand, I’m one step closer to personalizing it by putting some decent thought into the name; on the other hand, as of right now, I’m primarily looking at the avatar in a functional capacity, as a virtual body needed to navigate a virtual space.

 

Skimming over the SL code of conduct, I found the paragraph about (essentially) respecting and protecting the privacy of others interesting, particularly in light of the ethics readings we did for class. If I remember correctly, it explicitly states that you are not allowed to share or post conversations with other people, without their permission. This struck me immediately as problematic, in terms of ethnographic research. Clearly the SL community is concerned with privacy issues much more than other online communities I’ve been exposed to; I think this is a good thing but doesn’t lend itself well to privately logging and publicly blogging about other SL people and their SL lives. Sure, you just have to ask permission…but how will this affect the interaction? Another rule I found interesting: refrain from any activity which slurs a real-world individual. Limits on free speech? Is this rule in place to keep RL separated from SL, or to solidify a connection between the two? Does this mean I can’t make derogatory references to a certain world leader, that people make derogatory references to in RL all the time? Or is it only referring to SL individuals who have an RL counterpart?

 

At first I had trouble plugging into SL, and then I realized I was signing in with my real name and not my newly created avatar’s name. This made me very conscious of having a separate SL identity…and one that is truly from scratch – as opposed to the usernames for online accounts that people tend to use over and over; in my case, there is one particular username I tend to use, which I suppose constitutes as my frequent online (textual) avatar. Once the mistake was corrected, I was catapulted into Kaizen Island. My avatar appeared on the screen naked, and I was surprised to find myself self-conscious about this, in front of the other clothed avatars in the vicinity; consequently I found myself a bit relieved when my clothes appeared. The physical environment was great, very Alice-Through-the-Looking Glass – I was standing on a “life-size” chessboard, with huge, floating chess pieces, set in the midst of some other white buildings and rolling, green landscape. I was almost immediately befriended by someone, a male avatar, whom I’ll call Crush. He could tell I was new to SL and told me he was new as well. Crush was in Bangalore – IT capitol of India – and I found myself wondering if that’s what he did for a living in RL. He wanted to know where I was located in RL, and I had to think for a minute whether I wanted to lie or tell the truth – not for security’s sake, but just because I could.

 

I decided to tell the truth, but this struck me as an interesting reaction…I don’t feel compelled to lie in different online environments, despite the fact that I can do it just as easily. I think: the urge to feel liberated through lying about my location has to do with some preconceptions I may have about SL (and perhaps some boxes I’ve put myself into, in other online environments) – namely, that it is an escapist environment. You can look, be and do whatever you want, and that’s a part of the concept, no? Then again, nothing I’ve read about SL has led me to that notion, other than the modes of transportation. In fact, what most interested me about the evolution of SL since I first heard about it, was how similar to RL it has and is becoming. What are people doing in SL? They’re advertising, they’re making money, they’re worrying about their appearance, socializing, and acquiring virtual-material possessions. And in my case, they’re submitting themselves to RL social codes that seem quite unnecessary within the social realm of SL. But it’s only my first venture into SL after all, so perhaps these are my expectations culled simply from what I’ve read.

 

My first instinct was to just look around and figure out how to move. I found navigation relatively easy just from my limited experience with video games, and immediately went into MouseLook in order to observe my surroundings. A lot of people were just standing around, some were walking/running, one or two were levitating. Crush was continuing conversation, wanting to know where the dance clubs were and I found it a bit difficult to converse with him while at the same time trying to get my bearings. I asked him what motivated him to try out Second Life, and he said it was referenced in a BBC article about another virtual world platform up for launch next spring called Metaface. I down-sized SL momentarily to scroogle Metaplace, a virtual world integrated with the web and which will allow users to build their own virtual worlds and network them. A bit difficult for me to fully visualize, but it seems pretty interesting – I wonder how people will use it differently from SL. Meanwhile, Crush is asking me why I haven’t moved at all…and I become aware of my completely observable, virtual body. I couldn’t multi-task invisibly the way I could with a textual avatar. I explained what I was doing, but Crush had already flown to a dance club and was asking me to join him. Having no idea how to do that, I began browsing the different interface and menu options. He told me the name of the club and to just fly north, and was of little help when I pressed for further instructions – “Isn’t it all about keys and mouse?” he said. I told him I was going to explore a bit further, and then after that, check out Orientation Island.

 

I walked over to one of the buildings in which there were display boards of different comics. On my way over I saw an avatar dancing in the middle of the grass, by herself. It might have been a novel sight in RL, but after seeing other avatars just standing around or levitating, it seemed a completely acceptable SL activity. I felt a disconnect with my virtual body nonetheless. What made her want to virtually dance? She didn’t seem like a newbie just figuring things out, since her avatar was well developed (here I could have checked her SL birthday and profile, but didn’t know how yet). I tried to think what might compel me to dance virtually (especially without a context i.e. a virtual dance hall) – and without coming up with any immediate answers, respected the dancing avatar for her playfulness, randomness, or whatever you might call it. Then I accepted the invitation to teleport to Orientation Island.

 

I went through Orientation Island – had some trouble with changing my appearance, perhaps a video card issue – the clothes and body features just weren’t showing up properly. Had a little trouble using the magnifying glass too. Everything else was easy. I saw a really interesting looking avatar and went up to get a better look when he startled me by saying hi. Here, I noticed two things. One – the interface being the same as a video game made it easy for me to forget that I was engaged in a virtual world integrated with the real world, that there were people in RL behind the other avatars, and that my own avatar and its behavior was visible to others in the same way as RL. My consciousness of my own avatar, especially in the Mouselook, went in and out. I thought nothing of going right up to another avatar and staring at him (just as I would think nothing of it in a video game with conscious-less characters) but once I realized there was a real person behind the avatar, I became embarrassed. I mean, I was literally right up in his face. Two – I wouldn’t classify myself as shy in RL, but something close to it (until I get to know people at least) and I noticed this carried over to SL. It seems both silly and sensible that social anxieties might cross the threshold from RL to SL, the same way concerns about appearance would (which is a social anxiety in itself, I suppose).

 

Fortunately the “froggie,” as he put it, who was wearing a huge, mad-hatter type hat, didn’t mind that I went right up in front of him to stare, without so much as saying hello; he was actually very friendly and said hi to everyone. I found it interesting how impressed one person was with Froggie’s avatar, approaching him with a high-five-like attitude; I heard others referring to it as a costume. In RL, such a costume would elicit a very different response I think – but maybe more interesting is the fact that everyone remained as removed from SL as I did, in that they recognized Froggie as an avatar and not as a virtual person. Perhaps it was because we were on Orientation Island, but I realized I had another expectation of SL – and that was that people within SL would be engaged to the point that an avatar would be perceived as an individual, and not just function as one; in other words, if someone looks like a frog in RL it seems appropriate to say – “hey, great costume!” – but in SL, I was perhaps expecting a different reaction. Finally, I was surprised to learn I could hear other people’s conversations and other people could hear mine. Wasn’t expecting that, and it definitely added an “RL” dimension to my interactions with people. Can you whisper in SL?

 

I spent several hours in SL for my first venture, and imagine subsequent ventures will last that long. It’s easy to get absorbed and there is certainly a lot to explore.

~ by glycerine517 on September 20, 2007.