The Making of Second Life

December 24, 2007
For those unfamiliar with the hype or the ridicule, Second Life is a “massively multi-user online world,” a vast simulation created by ordinary loggers-in using 3-D graphic-design tools from the site's proprietor, Linden Labs. Posing as animated “avatars,” “Residents” ramble or fly through the videoscape; they socialize with other avatars, create art, have sex, build cities, open shops and nightclubs, spend Linden Dollars (redeemable for real dollars) and fight wars, all while seated at their computer screens. Au, a journalist who chronicled the site as Linden Labs' reporter-avatar, visits the usual dot-com–saga touchstones. There's the shoestring startup by eccentric geeks; the pilgrimage to Burning Man; the bloviating visionary founder, Philip Rosedale (“I'm passionate about Second Life because there doesn't need to be a God”); the marketing gobbledygook about “Leverag Metaverse Brands.” Au celebrates Second Life as a seedbed for unfettered cybercapitalism, a liberating outlet for the masses' pentup creativity and a “lucid dream” that erases the virtual-real divide. Alas, in his telling, Second Life's ongoing fantasia—“the monkey now perched on the wing screamed 'DIEEEE' as he strafed a well-armed babe in a bikini”—feels very much like a recounted dream: creative, certainly, but rather tedious and patently irrelevant.

February 15, 2008
Linden Labs gave Au, a highly accomplished technology journalist, the opportunity to describe the growth, from launch, of its highly popular virtual 3-D product Second Life. Second Life is appropriately named because individuals can create "avatars," also called "residents," to interact with others and enhance this universe through their own user-generated content. Avatars engage in many humanlike behaviors, such as communication, sexual relations, and wealth attainment. Second Life even has its own currency, Linden Dollars, which is convertible into U.S. dollars. Au has drawn on his own extensive Second Life experience, including online interviews with avatars and offline interviews with the persons behind them. He presents a comprehensive account that shows why Second Life may be the next great frontier and why it is so appealing to individuals and enterprises worldwide. Au also discusses the interaction between real life and this online world, the many ethical and policymaking issues Linden Labs has encountered, and the future of Second Life. This intriguing work is suitable for both public and academic libraries.Caroline Geck, Kean Univ., Union, NJ

Copyright 2008 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

March 15, 2008
Au, who has written feature articles for the Los Angeles Times and online magazines such as Salon, acted as the embedded journalist during the first three years of the ever popular online world Second Life. As opposed to other virtual realities, such as The Simms, the residents of Second Life have the full power to cocreate themselves and the environment in which they live, building entire cities that morph continuously as members expand on each others work. The epitome of Web 2.0, where users take an active role in creating content, Second Life has all the features of real life and more: money, real estate, bars and other hangouts, deeply developed personal relationships, even a quirky version of sex. Possibilities are only restrained by the imagination. Au charts the course of the evolution of Second Life from an idea in its creators minds to the megahit that it is today, with many surprising revelations on the possibilities that unfold within this virtual reality.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2008, American Library Association.)