I have no doubt that by now everyone has seen this little beauty, but I love it so much that I feel the need to repost it as a visual intro to my 2nd link:
“Jowls are available: Jenny Diski on Second Life” at the London Review of Books.
Brilliant. Simply brilliant. I do not begrudge anyone their efforts at entertainment, relaxation, and fantasy, but if you think you are doing anything actually important, please think again.
First link courtesy of Richard at Inherent Vice. Second link courtesy of the ever illuminating 3 quarks daily.
For reading, I was directed to the Library, where, this being a simulacrum of the modern world, for a few Linden dollars I bought a copy of Shakespeare’s Sonnets. But reading, after all, is and always has been a second life. So now a virtual me was carrying around a virtual book of poetry. And if my avatar (Jehu, I called my/herself) could have read it I/she would have done so to keep the virtual world out, just as I have done for much of my real life. Though, of course, my fantasy self couldn’t actually read my unreal book because an avatar doesn’t read or do anything, being entirely dependent on the will and brainpower of a real self out here in First Life directing it. — Jenny Diski
5 responses so far ↓
1 Get a (First) Life! « Thus Spoke Pragmatic Librarian // Feb 5, 2007 at 3:22 pm
[...] 5th, 2007 at 9:18 pm (Web 2.0, Virtual reality) Via Mark Linder’s blog, I found links to a satirical website called Get a First Life, as well as a London Review Bookshop [...]
2 Jacob // Feb 5, 2007 at 5:14 pm
Fernando observed during a break in class last week that 2nd life “virtual” people actually consume more real resources than human beings. Scary, huh?
3 Mark // Feb 5, 2007 at 7:43 pm
Yes, Jacob, I have seen some things recently on the energy usage of Second Life (and I have no doubt WoW and similar) and it is simply incredible!
But damn it! This is the Western world and we can do whatever we want with the world’s resources cause, like, well, we’re the bosses, or something.
I mean if all those people with no clean water, or without food, or no energy to heat their hovels would just get a Second Life then the world would be a better place.
Maybe I’m being a tad harsh, but it completely baffles me how so many (intelligent/educated) people can think the world is made up of so many completely disconnected things.
4 walt crawford // Feb 6, 2007 at 10:04 am
Jacob, Mark, I haven’t seen those figures, but I’m not surprised. I had the same reaction when I was reading, once again, that we’re all going to spend big bucks to totally automate everything in our homes, so they’re all interconnected and your stove can interrupt your TiVo viewing to tell you dinner’s ready. With, of course, a household server or two running this all–and EVERYTHING having idle current, not just your TV and computer and microwave. The results absolutely have to be considerably more overall power consumption…but this doesn’t seem to bother anyone.
[OK, I'm a native Californian--and Californians have been practicing energy conservation for a while. According to one recent report, the average Californian consumes half the electricity of the average Texan.]
5 Jason // Feb 6, 2007 at 5:35 pm
The third paragraph in Mark’s comment actually touches on a problem I have with all the hype over Web 2.0 and its various manifestations. I don’t have a problem with Web 2.0 per se, especially since it has provided many people (including myself) with opportunities to express themselves in ways that would have been impossible before. However, the way some people talk about Web 2.0, one would think that humanity has entered a whole new age where anyone can be “person of the year.” Even though more people can express themselves to a much broader audience, Web 2.0 has yet to bring an end to a number of problems in the non-digital realm. It might help, but it has a long way to go.
If I have my nomenclature right, I see a big irony in all this. Putting it crudely, Web 2.0 sounds like a kind of “communistic” realm, but we function in a “capitalistic” realm that can encroach on creative works in Web 2.0. (And as Jenny Diski points out, capitalism is alive and well in Second Life.) I’m not necessarily saying that it’s bad, depending on individual cases. However, we shouldn’t fool ourselves into thinking that Web 2.0 has changed society at other fundamental levels. Needless to say, I have been struggling with the tensions between Web 2.0 “communism” and real world “capitalism,” which is why I haven’t expounded on it in my own blog. Perhaps someone smarter than me knows what I’m getting at.
(Regarding Walt’s comment about Texas… we probably spend more than Californians because it gets so danged hot here. Unfortunately, too many places go overboard with air conditioning in the summer, and one has to bring a coat to some public places.)