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Thursday, March 19, 2009

Tech I Think We're Alone Now

Posted by Paul Constant on Thu, Mar 19, 2009 at 5:45 PM

I was going through my RSS feeds today when I decided to take a look at the less-read folders. Suddenly, I remembered that I had a folder to keep track of those wacky folks on Second Life! Remember Second Life? Everybody loved Second Life for a little while! Reuters even had a Second LIfe bureau to keep track of Second Life goings-on because it was all so ground-breaky. Let's check in with that bureau, shall we?

790d/1237507693-secondjournalism.jpg

I think Second Life is officially dead now, like the Pet Rock. Consider the fact that at one time I had twenty-four blogs in my Second Life folder and now all but three RSSs—all three of which are published by the people at Linden Labs, which is the company that runs Second Life—have gone completely silent. Goodnight, Second Life.

It was lovely getting to know you.

Comments (17) RSS

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Bizarre. I'd have thought there would be lots more going on in Second Life now that there are so many unemployed computer-savvy types around.

Posted by Greg on March 19, 2009 at 5:53 PM

wtf!

Can you murder in Second Life? If not you should be able to!

Posted by Sad Comment on March 19, 2009 at 6:10 PM

thank god. second life was pretty much the sewer of the internet. well, one of 'em. now all that's left are 4chan and ebay.

Posted by guy on March 19, 2009 at 6:36 PM

The time-wasting methods of choice seem to be dealing in shorter and shorter attention lengths as the time we have to waste increases. My grandpa used to call it "frittering away your time" but now it's an entire industry.

Maybe I'll build a Fritter app for the iPhone. I'll bet virtual whittling would be a big hit right.

Posted by Erskine on March 19, 2009 at 6:43 PM

now.

Posted by Erskine on March 19, 2009 at 6:44 PM

Yikes. If that is a sample of what Second Life was like, I'm surprised it lasted more than about a week. Eww.

Posted by Reverse Polarity on March 19, 2009 at 6:50 PM

I never felt I had my life sorted out enough to justfy starting a virtual Second Life.

Posted by Zander on March 19, 2009 at 7:00 PM

give it a few years and there'll be a slog post about twitter that will go something like, "Remember TWITTER? Everybody loved TWITTER for a little while! Reuters even had a TWITTER PROFILE to keep track of TWITTER goings-on because it was all so ground-breaky."

just like anything online people will get bored with the fad of the moment.

Posted by z3381300p on March 19, 2009 at 7:33 PM

Funny, I feel exactly the same way about BBS', Compuserve, rec.arts.tv.startrek, Tribe.net & MySpace...

Posted by COMTE on March 19, 2009 at 8:01 PM

what the crap is second life?

Posted by olive on March 19, 2009 at 8:28 PM

I'd check it out, but I'm too busy on Friendster.

Posted by mint chocolate chip on March 19, 2009 at 8:35 PM

I remember when I used to be on Compusmurf, Tribe, and did BBS at 1200 baud while Al Gore was on 300 baud.

Second Life is for losers who play football instead of MLS.

Posted by Will in Seattle on March 19, 2009 at 8:36 PM

The primary audience seemed to be bored housewives.

Maybe because their husbands are on unemployment, they don't have the luxury to fantasize with 'cyberlovers'.

Posted by Desperate Househusbands on March 19, 2009 at 10:32 PM

I poked around on there briefly 2 times I think, and came to the conclusion that it was probably going to be full of strange people using avatars designed like aliens doing cyber with each other - Not That There's Anything Wrong With That - and never went back.

Posted by MarkyMark on March 20, 2009 at 2:51 AM

There's still lots going on in SL; it just isn't news anymore. It didn't catch on enough for big advertising companies to keep spending money on it; it certainly didn't become the next WWW. Apparently, either people don't want to have 3D avatars running around in some kind of 3D WWW/virtual space, or SL was not quite the way to do it, and 3L will appear in a year or six.

Posted by breklor on March 20, 2009 at 11:02 AM

I think the real tragedy of Second Life is that there are people who take it so seriously as being a legitimate form of communicating or congregating. I heard this lame-ass piece on NPR last week about a social science prof who forced his students to attend class via Second Life. The class location was a beach with a campfire ("it's comforting, and allows people to feel at ease, open up"). Ugh.

Posted by arts&letters on March 20, 2009 at 4:13 PM

Second Life died because it wasn't World of Warcraft.

Posted by east coaster on March 20, 2009 at 10:23 PM