“Shared experiences create a sense of reality”
It is hard for me to fathom the concept of a Second Life. Life would, for most anyway, distinguish one from the dead, experiencing, actively participating, achieving in real things is the cornerstone of life. Second Life for instance, provides thousands of people with a virtual reality... with some arguably realistic elements. The available exchange of second life money into trade-able currency in the real world is its most amazing innovation. Not to mention the ability for business to grow within the virtual world and for people to run business ventures from their studies at home.

Experiences are the utmost REAL thing you can feel, touch, taste, see, hear and interact with. They are what makes us all unique, they are what teach us our lessons (or sometimes not), They are what make us learn, grow and evolve. A virtual reality created by humans can merely be exactly that..... Virtual, So the question is, can experiences in a virtual world like Second Life ever truly replace real experiences? Real life experiences are what makes life exciting, depressing, forever changing and never stopping until the end. Nothing in a virtual world could ever truly compare to the real thing.

Perhaps interactions over a world wide virtual network like Second Life embody what we consider to be similar to reality, but on a computer, however this is just simply a way for one to interact. The fact that virtual money can be exchanged in to trade able currency around the world makes it realer then it seems. Moreover it just seems like a way of escaping from a reality that perhaps you never really had any control over. When you are on Second Life you are not Joe Blow from Timbuktu... you are what ever you want to be... literally. When one is on Second Life, they can embody whomever they want, lie about where they are from and what they do. Lies like these in real life tend to catch up with you pretty fast. One cant live a life and pretend to be something their not, it tends to come crashing down.

Time magazines Kristina Dell suggests Second Life is a way of exploring self expression in different ways. From different forms of cybersex, to virtual activism, Second life provides an avenue for users to express themselves in ways that maybe are too risky in real life. However, freedom of expression is one thing, but using the site to cater for what are otherwise illegal activities, is wrong. The FBI in 2007 prompted Linden Labs (creators of second life) to shut down online casino's as online gambling is illegal in the US. Also European police have been monitoring the distribution and trading of pornographic material of real children on the site, shutting down and taking action if necessary. Many European Governments are not all too happy that adult Avatars can in fact have sex with child like Avatars. Since the outrage Linden has banned and controlled much of this lewd content on the site. Furthermore Linden Labs has lawsuits against them constantly regarding the terms and conditions of the ownership of virtual Real Estate and so forth. Considering up to $7-8 million (figures from 2007) changes hands nearly every month and the site apparently is only growing in popularity, Linden has much more of this to look forward to. Moreover, "griefers" are running rife through the site as there are no penalties to deter them from harassment.

It would seem despite creating some sort of euphoric atmosphere within the constraints of the internet, Linden Labs, in the beginning anyway forgot that people are capable of anything. Unwittingly they created a medium for crime to be committed, and at least for now anyway, they are taking the steps to remedy this.

The simple fact of the matter is that Second Life is not reality, it is not a kin to what we have in the here and now and it will never replace it. For Meadow's to say "this tells me there is something real happening here" is absurd. Real is tangible, real is the First and only Life one is privileged to enjoy. Perhaps what Meadows is trying to say is "reality is what we make it" and if you want your reality to be contrived, controlled and manipulated by a computer networking company... then, as the old adage tell us "each to their own", but if you ask me... you're missing out man!